SEA=STORE is a project by Thomas Nölle for the Drap-Art'16 Festival of Barcelona.
It consists of performances in the public space with Portable Micro-Museums, and the installation of the Ephemeral Museum consisting of an eco-building dome using reeds in the Plaça dels Àngels square, in front of the Museum MACBA in Barcelona.

Both parts of the Project approach the question of the fragility of ecosystems as well as of human memory and history.

The Portable Micro-Museums use a classic "vendor tray" design. They exhibit the Thomas's small boxes with objects. Each piece in SEA≈STORE is both an art object and an object of urban marine archaeology, recovered from the sea and the beaches of the Barceloneta by Thomas Nölle in the 1990s, before and after de Olympic Games.

During the performances with the Portable Micro-Museums, the artist donates his work to people committed to the preservation of the marine ecosystem.

Grounded in the sharing economy, each participant sends a tweet or selfie with his or her new work to the SEA≈STORE social media network.
Instagram: seastore_art, Twitter: @seastore_art

In this way, the participant’s followers on social media and new art collectors preserve uniquely genuine fragments of Barcelona’s history, while simultaneously contributing to the cleaning of the oceans.

The Ephemeral Museum SEA≈STORE is create to be an open space for the direct dialog with the public, as well as habitat and laboratory of art activities about marine ecosystem arising from the project, in collaboration with the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Barcelona and Mar Viva of the Agency of Residues of Catalonia and the fishermen of the Port of Barcelona.

SEA≈STORE ensure visibility for the ambiguous condition of resistance or longevity of garbage. The project uses art and the system of collaborative sharing to return to society what was discarded in the past. The people take home what was waste material and it has been transformed into "precious" art object.

Workshops: Thomas Nölle, in collaboration with Carles Mariné.Performances & workshops: In collaboration with the Universidad de Barcelona, students of the Grado en Bellas Artes and Grado en Diseño, teaching staff Aprendizaje–Servicio de la Facultad de Bellas Artes, coordinated by Eulàlia Grau & Joan Miquel Porquer.Design and construction of the dome: Investigació Canyera, in collaboration with colectivo LHRC.Audiovisual Production: Sue Wetjen.

With the support by: Proyecto Mar Viva de la Agència de Residus de Catalunya; Restaurante Barceloneta.

Thomas Nölle takes part in the exhibition of the Festival Drap-Art'16 with a selection of works from 1990 to 2016, brought together under the title SEA≈STORM. The common denominator of all the pieces is the critical vision with regard to the unsustainable practices of the consumption societies, and how they have influence on the natural ecosystem, including human beings. SEA≈STORM is closely connected with SEA≈STORE, with its performances and intervention in the public space, also presents in the Festival.

Using found objects of diverse origins, especially from the beaches of the Barceloneta in the 1990s, Nölle establishes a close symbiosis between the natural world and the urban and industrial garbage objects (electronic chips, plastic, floor tiles, bones, etc.).

These objects, found by a kind of archaeological work, are used in assemblages, boxes or mosaics, which explore the concept of “contemporary relics” of the urban-technological environment and nature.

To this end mechanical or technological structures are assembled with genuine insects and shells, as well as illustrations of parts of human figures. His collection of collaborative human–nature relics are testimony of resistance and, simultaneously, subtle critique of the consumption society for the ecologically unsustainable practices.

From the central topic concerning the marine ecosystem, Thomas approaches the question of the fragmentation of memory and history. According to Thomas, "the mentality of throwaway culture is reflected in its relation with history and memory, considered provisional and of decreasing relevance. Following this voluntary amnesia remain al least only fragments, difficult to decipher."

Thomas critique is extended to the art market. For Thomas, "in the same way as the hyper consumption is doing away with values like taking care, appreciate or repair, also it is transforming the art objects into fashionable, cyclical and disposable products." (T. Nölle).